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Mullach
Beacon (Period Unassigned), Fort (Period Unassigned), Vitrified Stone (Period Unassigned)
Site Name Mullach
Classification Beacon (Period Unassigned), Fort (Period Unassigned), Vitrified Stone (Period Unassigned)
Canmore ID 65809
Site Number NX98NW 6
NGR NX 9291 8698
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/65809
- Council Dumfries And Galloway
- Parish Kirkmahoe
- Former Region Dumfries And Galloway
- Former District Nithsdale
- Former County Dumfries-shire
NX98NW 6 9291 8698.
(NX 9291 8698) Camp (NR)
OS 6" map (1957)
A vitrified fort occupies the summit of Mullach, a prominent hill (listed as a beacon stance in 1448, in the Acts of the Parliament of Scotland, 716). The fort is oval in shape, having two concentric walls about 30m apart. The enclosed area measures about 91m by 74m and several masses of vitrified stone are visible in the rubble ruins of the walls. A narrow gap through the walls in the SE probably indicates an entrance. The site, which has not been excavated, is likely to date from some time between the 8th and 4th centuries BC.
E W MacKie 1975; RCAHMS 1920, visited 1913
The remains of this fort, in an area formerly afforested and now covered in dense bracken, comprises two concentric stone walls 28.0m apart. The inner wall, enclosing an oval area 110.0m E-W by 120.0m transversely is visible only in the southern half as a grassed-over stony scarp 0.3m high. The better preserved outer walls survives in the southern half as a grassy bank 2.0m wide and 0.5m high and in the northern half as a slight scarp and parch mark.
No vitrified stone was seen in either of the walls nor were any facing stones visible. The entrance in the SE is obscured by bracken.
Resurveyed at 1:2500.
Visited by OS (TRG) 19 August 1976
Note (20 December 2013 - 31 August 2016)
The defences of this fort, which occupies the summit of a hill used in the 15th century as one of a chain of beacons along Nithsdale (RCAHMS 1920, xxxiv), comprises at least two stone ramparts, both now heavily dilapidated and grass-grown, in which pieces of vitrifaction have been found. Set about 28m apart, the inner, now little more than a stony scarp 0.3m high around the S half, encloses an oval area measuring about 120m from NW to SE by 95m transversely (1ha); the outer, which forms a bank up to 2m thick by 0.5m high, doubles the enclosed area to about 2ha. In addition, satellite imagery currently available reveals a third bank a further 60m down the slope in the NW quadrant, which projected concentrically round the rest of the circuit hints at the presence of a much larger enclosure of up to 6ha on this hilltop. No features have been noted in the interior of the fort, and the only evidence of an entrance is a narrow gap in both ramparts observed on the SE by Euan MacKie (1975, 46).
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 31 August 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC0336
